Did You Get Your NEWTS Today?
by Laume
Summary: Written for the Third Floor Corridor contest. No good deed goes unpunished. Fred and George are about to find out.


The Weasleys and Hermione were all gathered for a huge party on Neville's and Harry's joined birthdays.

When they had graduated Hogwarts a few weeks earlier, Neville and Harry had spent some time planning a huge celebration. Their birthdays were only a day or so apart, and since Harry still had a lot of birthdays to make up for, and Neville was never allowed a party, they decided to use the now completely cleaned Grimmauld Place.

Just as they settled down for a huge dinner, several Hogwarts owls flew in.

"The NEWT results," Ron said, paling. He took his letter with some trepidation. The twins eyed him, Harry and Neville curiously. Nobody bothered to look at Hermione, since they were all sure she had done the best.

"I made it!" Ron said happily, handing the letter to his mother, "I got all my owls, with two Outstanding and only one Average!"

The twins looked decidedly disgusted by this news, and turned hopefully to Harry and Neville.

"I got an honors in Herbology," Neville grinned happily, "and I made the rest too."

"Honors in Defense," Harry said, glancing apologetically at the twins, "Two O's and the rest all E's."

The twins looked defeated, and about to cry, when they heard a soft sob from Hermione.

The bushy haired Head Girl had put her head on her arms and sobbed.

"Hermione!" Ron and Harry exclaimed, "What's the matter? Did you get an E?"

Fred took the letter from Hermione's hand.

"Oh dear," he said, reading it,

"this is unexpected," his brother added,

"how did this happen, 'Mione?" they queried in unison.

Mrs Weasley pulled the letter from her sons hands and gasped.

"Hermione! How on earth…You have three T's, for Merlins sake! What happened?"

"I…I…I think…I spent too much time…snifffffff…on other stuff," the girl sobbed.

"What other stuff?" Harry and Ron said, "you spent every minute studying. You even managed to charm a laptop so that you could use it at Hogwarts."

Hermione had finally stopped crying, but looked truly miserable.

"I know. But I didn't use it for studying alone," she admitted, "I used it to write fanfiction."

The others stared at her.

"Fan…fiction?" Fred and George asked.

"Yes…I started reading some last summer and thought I could do better then some of the fics I read, and then I got caught up in it and…and…"

Mrs Weasley, and the rest of the table, looked horrified and dumbstruck, but Fred and George suddenly beamed, gathering Hermione up and sandwiching her in a Twin Hug.

"Come here, fellow drop-out," they said, "We are so proud. We had high hopes for this lot," they indicated the three boys, "but they let us down. We wanted to offer them a job at our shop if they failed their NEWTS, but now that they don't need it, we offer it to you!"

Hermione nearly fainted, had she not been held up by the twins.

"But…but…I'm no good at pranks!" she protested.

The twins snorted. "Who set Snape's robes on fire in her first year?" they asked incrudeously, "not even we have dared to do that…no offense, sir," they said at the potions master, who was sitting in a corner, sipping a butterbeer.

He sneered goodnaturedly at them.

"And who was responsible for providing Lee and us with the solution for our Skiving Snackbox boil problems?"

"Not to mention that if you got a laptop to work at Hogwarts, you are very skilled." George argued.

"So, you're hired! You can start September first."

The Weasley Twins soon realized they had made a dreadful mistake.

On her first day, Hermione scolded them about the sloppy set up of their store and reorganized everything, making sure the twins could not find a single item in their own shop. Fred and George burst into tears before the day was out.

On her second day, she scolded them for not thinking their experiments through properly. She wrote down half a mile of parchments with notes that would help the products currently being developed. While they appreciated the effort, Hermione's lack of disregard for rules also made sure the gags were no longer funny.

On the third day, she told half their clientéle off for buying Skiving Snackboxes, telling them they should not skip classes, and offering to share her 7 years worth of Hogwarts notes with them. Fred and George burst into tears for the second time.

On the fourth day, Hermione decided that Snape didn't need pranks; he needed a few good hugs. So she charmed the items bought for the purpose of pranking Snape. After a Floo call from the Potions Master and several written complaints from customers who demanded that due to Hermione's meddling, they should be compensated for the time they had spent in detention, Fred and George asked her what she had done.

When Hermione replied that she had charmed all items to transfigure into Teddy Bears the moment the Potions Master was close, they broke down crying for the third time.

On the fifth day, they refused to enter the shop. Hermione snorted, put her bag down, and started reorganizing the price tags.

Fred and George suddenly noticed her laptop in the bag, and with a single glance at each other, they took it out.

"My, Hermione CAN write, anything other then essays I mean," Fred admired.

"Absolutely, dear brother. Her talent is rather wasted here, I fear," George said thoughtfully.

"What did you have in mind, brother mine?"

George grinned, and took the laptop. "I'll be back," he sang.

That afternoon, Hermione was fired.

"It's for the best, you see," Fred said to the indignant girl,

"we have heard that you will receive a lucrative offer soon," George added,

"and we do not want to be in your way."

Luna entered.

"Oh Hermione," the dreamy girl said, smiling brightly, "Daddy was so impressed with your work. He is writing you a long letter, and you can start tomorrow."

Hermione just stared at the girl.

"What on earth do you mean?"

"Why," Luna said, "George told us your deepest passion is writing. After Daddy read your stuff, he immediately wanted to hire you."

She held out her hand to Hermione. "Welcome at the Quibbler," she said.


End file.
